Sig Christenson is a veteran military reporter who has made nine trips to the war zone. He writes regularly for Hearst about service members, veterans and heroes, among other topics. He is also the co-founder and former president of Military Reporters and Editors, founded in 2002.

Air Force Recruiting Service

06/13/2013

An Air Force
recruiter was acquitted late Wednesday of raping one woman and sexually
assaulting another in the backroom of his Houston-area office, but
jurors found him guilty of a host of charges that could land him in
prison the rest of his life.

Rodriguez previously pleaded guilty to six charges and 23 specifications of wrongdoing.

The
case is part of a scandal that has become the biggest in Air Force
history and continues to grow. So far, 67 recruits and trainees in
technical training at Lackland have been identified by the Air Force as
victims. Rodriguez was tried at Lackland because the Air Force
Recruiting Service is headquartered in San Antonio.

During the trial Wednesday, Maj. Naomi Dennis,
the lead defense attorney, sketched a picture of the tall, bespectacled
Rodriguez, who was married at the time of the encounters, as a
persistent suitor - not a rapist.

“It's not a black-and-white issue. Sex is about reading the gray areas, reading the signs,” she said.

But a prosecutor, Capt. Matthew Neil, reminded jurors that both women resisted Rodriguez, and pointed to Victim 9's efforts to push him away on multiple occasions.

“How many times, how many times, does a woman have to say no?” he said. “How many times does she have to push him away?”

A parade of witnesses told jurors Thursday how a Houston-area Air
Force recruiter transformed their lives after pursing liaisons with
them, some in the back room of his office.

A mother and her daughter, identified as Victim 15, took the stand and described the damage left by Tech. Sgt. Jaime Rodriguez.

“I can't explain how this changed everything,” said the mother, who is not being identified to protect the victim.

Sixteen
witnesses appeared, many of them telling a strikingly similar story
about Rodriguez, who was found guilty Wednesday of a long list of
sexual-misconduct charges. The witnesses testified Thursday in the
punishment phase of his trial, which continues Friday.

The women,
one who was 16 when she met Rodriguez, initially encountered him at
schools, job fairs and his Lake Jackson office. At first he was
professional, but Rodriguez later sent flirtatious texts that often
evolved into detailed descriptions of his sexual fantasies.

One of
them involved a ritual. He'd shutter the blinds of the office, lock the
door and hang up a “closed” sign before taking the women to a small
back office.

“He would send me sexting messages saying what he would do with me,” a 21-year-old Bay City nursing school student said.

“He asked me my sexual preferences, if I was ever interested in a woman,” said Victim 1, a senior airman.

Whenever
he had a chance, Rodriguez tried to bring his fantasies to life. An
airman based in California said that one day, he went through his ritual
at the office and then hugged and kissed her and asked for sex. The
woman said no.

A woman identified as Victim 11 went with him to
the back office, where she performed a sex act on him. Later, she
couldn't believe what happened.

“I didn't want to be there
anymore. I felt regret, shame,” the woman said, adding that after his
wife called, she eyed a photo of his children on a desk.

“My gosh,” she said to herself, “what did I just do?”

A
jury of eight male officers quietly listened as Victim 15's mother told
of how she stumbled over texts and graphic photos of Rodriguez that
were on her daughter's cellphone.

Her discovery was made on a
Sunday night, Nov. 13, 2011, a critical moment in a case that's among
the worst in years for the San Antonio-based Air Force Recruiting Service.

06/12/2013

A pair of women testified Wednesday that an Air Force recruiter
sexually assaulted them in the back room of his Lake Jackson office
after doggedly pursuing them.

Though the incidents occurred separately, both said that Tech. Sgt.
Jaime Rodriguez followed the same pattern that led to the encounters,
which they said they resisted.

He sent a flurry of text messages that initially were flirtatious but
turned graphic, both testified. Later, they said Rodriguez locked the
door of his recruiting office, put up a "closed" sign before luring each
of them to a back room.

"He began to grope me and kiss me and sat me down on the desk and
then he began to rub (on her) and from there he kept trying to put his
finger inside me," said a woman identified as Victim 9, who is an airman
first class.

A jury of eight officers, all men, including two captains and three
colonels, heard the women testify most of the morning, with prosecutors
and the defense resting their cases. The allegations were among the
worst in years for the San Antonio-based Air Force Recruiting Service.

Jurors are expected to weigh evidence involving both women and could
hand Rodriguez a life sentence if they find him guilty of rape,
aggravated sexual contact, forcible sodomy, assault consummated by
battery and indecent exposure. He already pleaded guilty to six charges
and 23 specifications of wrongdoing that carry 54 years in prison.

The case is part of a scandal that has become the biggest in Air
Force history and continues to grow. So far, 67 recruits and trainees in
technical training have been identified by the Air Force as victims in
the scandal. The number rose this week from 63, but it wasn't
immediately clear why.

06/05/2013

A non-commissioned officer charged with raping a young applicant in
his Lake Jackson office went on trial Thursday in San Antonio.

Tech. Sgt. Jaime Rodriguez could get life in prison on eight charges and 32 specifications of misconduct in his trial here at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland.

The trial was to start Monday, but was delayed.

Rodriguez is accused of trying to develop intimate relationships with 14 women, most of them applicants seeking to join the Air Force.
Two victims were recruiter's assistants, airmen who had recently
graduated from basic training and doing the job while spending time at
home.

The Air Force said the Houston-area recruiter used his position to
leverage sexual favors from a woman identified as Female 15, and lied in
an official statement.

When questioned about the incident, Rodriguez was asked if he sent the woman photos of himself wearing only underwear.

“No,” he replied.

The charges reflected a pattern of misconduct among basic training
instructors at Lackland, 33 of them brought under investigation during
the past 18 months for pursing or having intimate relationships with
recruits and technical school trainees.

So far, 63 people have been classified by the Air Force as victims, all but a few of them women.